Jason Phillips | Black Knuckle and Deputy Maltese / 2018

how the west was one

by Douglas Messerli

 

Theo Poling (screenplay), Jason Phillips (director) Black Knuckle and Deputy Maltese / 2018 [15 minutes]

 

In the anachronistic rewriting of the American West that Jason Phillips’ Black Knuckle and Deputy Maltese represents, the town sheriff is a woman (Kym Wilson) and her deputy Maltese (Lane Campton) is a somewhat closeted gay man in love with their regular prisoner, Black Knuckle (Gabriel Sousa) who keeps getting into trouble just so that he can be locked up with Maltese, who regularly releases him after pretending to be tied up and overcome with violence.

    But this time, despite his almost overwhelming desires, Maltese has had enough, knowing that, after 8 arrests and presumably as many escapes, his job is on the line. He does not intend to tolerate another arrest of his lover or word might finally get out to the Coal Ridge citizens about their real intentions. He wants him, so he claims, to “stay gone.” But Black Knuckle refuses to give up on his favorite deputy.

     Once more Maltese opens the jail cell door and sends his lover off, calling him back only so that he can tie him up: “Make it look realistic.” The suggestion is that they are also into S&M.

      This time it costs Maltese his badge. But this time on top of everything, Black Knuckle has been kidnapped by outlaws, real outlaws too, not petty thieves like Black Knuckle. And Maltese is asked by Sheriff Schaefer to join her, not as a deputy, but as part of the posse to bring Black Knuckle home and arrest the wily outlaw gang.

       The Sheriff’s group, consisting of her, Maltese and a dunderhead named Ricky (Ian Elliott) soon find the camp of the 5 outlaws and determine to take them in the morning. The next morning, they grab one the females of the outlaw gang, gone a way’s off to piss, before knocking out the eldest of the group. But the others quickly put a gun to Black Knuckle’s head and demand the Sheriff’s posse reveal themselves. The Sheriff and Ricky appear and give up their guns, but Maltese hanging back gives a signal, hitting a frying pan over one of their heads, as the Sheriff head-butts another, and Ricky grabs a third. However, the head of the group, The Dark Rider, is hardly fazed by the frying pan’s effect, and as Maltese readies for hand-to-hand combat, although the situation looks dicey.

      But suddenly Black Knuckle grabs a dropped gun and saves the day by arresting the entire outlaw gang. Of course, Maltese has to tie up his friend Black Knuckle again as well, the Sheriff warning him, as the two secretively rub their fingers across each other’s hands, to keep him tied. And a short while later Sheriff Schaefer walks the entire troop into town. As Maltese again unties Black Knuckle, the Sheriff again intervenes suggesting that since the jail will be all filled up, she’s ready to let Black Knuckle go, sending her former deputy off the shine boots in order to get his badge back.

       As she turns to go, she winks, commenting in an aside, “You could’ve just told me.” And before you know it, there’s a hoe-down in the local bar where Black Knuckle and Maltese are sitting at a table sharing a drink, around them, native American and Hispanic women, blacks and their lesbian friends. Maltese finally asks for a dance and they rise to the occasion with a deep kiss, the whole town applauding, one local claiming she “knew it “and winning a bet she’d made on her guess that the two were a natural pair.

 

Los Angeles, April 14, 2023

Reprinted from World Cinema Review (April 2023).